Are we preparing them for the future or sending them down the Boulevard of Broken Dreams?

Rumors and Memos

May 14, 2013 MEMO TO: All Buffalo Teachers FROM: Philip Rumore, President, BTF RE: Bringing the Battle to Washington We have to go to the heart of the beast that is masquerading as educational reform in Washington, DC. To do that, we will be challenging both of our affiliates, the National Education Association (NEA) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT), to work together on the following including the removal of Arnie Duncan as Secretary of Education. The motion that I recommended to the BTF Executive Committee and that was passed unanimously will be introduced at the National Council of Urban Education Associations (NCUEA), the presidents of NEA’s largest locals, and then at the NEA National Representative Assembly. As you can see I will be making the motion and the President of Plainview-Old Bethpage, Morton Rosenfeld, will be seconding it. While I expect “concerns” from the faint of heart relating to the removal of the Secretary of Education, we are prepared to do battle. Stay tuned. FYI – Our next negotiation session is set for Thursday, May 16, 2013. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NBI for NCUEA and NEA Representatives Assembly STATEMENT OF MOTION: The NEA will work with the AFT to develop a unified action plan to address the educationally destructive, divisive and punitive initiatives that are undermining teaching and learning and which are not only destroying our students’ love of learning but their ability to think critically and be creative. Such unified action plan may include but should not be limited to: · developing a unified message relating to the damaging impact and shortcomings of the reliance on standardized testing of our students on our students and educators, · a positive agenda of what will help teachers teach and students learn, · a unified plan to replace Arne Duncan as Secretary of the Department of Education and bring about the changes in the policies of the Department of Education that will help teachers teach and students learn, · removing from State and federal legislation the requirement that 95% of the students enrolled in schools be required to take State assessments or lose funding e.g. Section III (b) (2) I (ii) as said requirement is being used against parents who wish to remove their children from the harmful effects of standardized tests, (see Legislation and Regulations Being Used Memo) · a unified action plan to defend our members against the abusive and destructive evaluation procedures, · a unified message to members based on these concerns, · a unified national message based upon these concerns, · collaborating with other concerned organizations. RATIONALE FOR MOTION: In these difficult times, now more than ever, both NEA and AFT, while keeping their own identities and beliefs, must find a common ground to work together in the interests of our students and those who participate in the education to end the institutionalized child abuse called standardized testing as well as competitive funding based upon unproven and educationally destructive programs and regulations. We must also assist parents who wish to protect their children from the harmful effects of standardized tests. MAKER: Phil Rumore ASSOCIATION: Buffalo Teachers Federation SECONDER: Morton Rosenfeld ASSOCIATION: Plainview–Old Bethpage Congress of Teachers

My 3 Masterpieces

Student mad at teacher at Duncanville high

Am I the only one who sees the irony in this happening at Duncan-ville High?

Invitation to a Dialogue: The Art of Teaching

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/01/opinion/invitation-to-a-dialogue-the-art-of-teaching.html?smid=pl-share

inBloom Inc

Democracy remains alive in Chicago as Critical Mass rides for Public Education

     Hundreds of Critical Mass riders dressed in red and flooded the streets of Chicago on Friday to show support for CPS students, teachers and families who are facing the closure of more than 54 neighborhood schools.
     Do you know what happens when neighborhood schools are declared failures and shut down? Moms and dads have the "choice" of putting their kids on a bus to the nearest charter school, where someone makes a nice little profit from the whole arrangement, and the child may or may not ever learn how to read.

What are YOU waiting for?

Senior Survey...It's a MANDATE

Give us your information so we can make scatterplots!


     All seniors will be required to complete the Senior Survey through their government classes beginning on April 29. It is a state mandate to capture college selection, financial aid, and scholarship information. Responses will be used to send final transcripts to colleges, generate scattergrams in Family Connection for future students, and list scholarship winners (NOT amounts, just names) in the Senior Awards program. Please make sure students come to the survey prepared.

 

Community Service, Texas style

posted by Houston ISD Confidential: My Years on the Front Lines of Education Reform (Notes) on Friday, April 26, 2013 at 8:42am

     Ethically speaking, I would never condone experimenting on high school students. Yet, the state of Texas, with cooperation from testing giant, Pearson Education division, both have no qualms about using them as guinea pigs. Then the domino effect occurs when anyone and everyone hops on the gravy train and produces "test prep" materials--once again unproven as to their value. Turnabout seemed fair play in this upside down world of education, so why not conduct my own experiment?


     The perfect chance came last summer when one of the reading prep workbooks had a selection about "community service."  From this article, I felt safe guessing that the people who put together these materials had never actually stepped into an urban classroom as it did not in any way, shape or form equate to what my students and I knew as "community service."


     The reading was a cheerful, evangelistic piece about how community service was "giving back" to the community---how the experience helped with college goals. Then, there were questions afterwards to show that the students had synthesized this information by writing small paragraphs about it.


     Knowing absolutely what I was doing and feeling a little guilty about experimenting on my students, I stayed on the straight and narrow and only discussed the piece in its context per our worksheets---as a way to change the world and make a difference. Deep inside, it was a different story. No Child Left Behind (NCLB) has become, to the students I taught, No Child Left Untouched by the Criminal Justice System (NCLUCJS doesn't have quite the same ring to it). In some bizarre line of thought, the "education reformers" decided that a forced march through education backed by the fear of law enforcement would endear learning to these students.


     Here's how it goes: if they miss three days of unexcused absences, they have to appear in court where the judge assigns "community service."  That's right---not a college goal or "giving back" community service, but a punishment. In addition, it seems that Houston ISD school administrators have signed off on discipline, handing it over to HISD police and sometimes the actual Houston Police Department.

 

     Tickets and court time are also given out freely for almost any offense. "Community service" becomes the option of choice because without this, tickets would translate into unaffordable fines or jail time.


     So, the result of my hypothesis on what my students would write? All 40 of them wrote that "community service" was how they were punished. It's all they had ever known. They each elaborated on this theme in different ways, but the message in each student's work was the same----it was as if they hadn't read the selection and if they had, it didn't make any sense to them.


     Somehow, I knew that this would be their conclusion as much as I had hoped they would just roll with the workbook and pick up on its alternate universe. I felt completely helpless---I couldn't sway them as their teacher (which begs the questions of what effect educators actually have on students). Knowing that they would present this worldview to some faceless Pearson temporary workers grading their papers, my heart sank even lower. These graders would probably would fail all my students as having "wrong" or "irrelevant" answers, when the students' answers were 100 percent right and 100 percent relevant to their lives. I wish it weren't so. I wish the experiment had failed miserably.


     The only solution? Hope that a similar reading wasn't on the actual STAAR test and hope that the policy makers and testing empires would somehow encounter reality. I don't know many professions that are based on wishful thinking, but education has been reduced to such a philosophy. As the late, great Kurt Vonnegut said, "So it goes."

Whistle blower protection for desperate teachers? NYS pushes testing mandates to the limit

     Gail DeBonis Richmond just posted the following:

     This is from a teacher, also a parent of students Refusing the test. If you are a teacher in NYS who has been given a DIRECTIVE you are uncomfortable with or which goes against your moral compass, please inbox me. I will be a whistleblower, without using your name or district.
     I swear.
 
     "I just heard the most disturbing story to date about testing. This is from the parents. A 3rd grade child is in the hospital to receive very intensive treatment for a condition. The child is sedated and hooked up to machines. A 'teacher' walks into his hospital room with #2 pencils and the NYS test, all ready to administer!

    Needless to say, the parents are shocked, disgusted and appalled, and so am I. WTF doesn't even begin to explain the ??s running through my head right now. I want to know who is giving the order for districts to hunt children down in hospitals to take these tests."